Public Appointments Privacy Statement

The City Clerk's Office collects personal information from applicants for public appointment to determine eligibility and qualifications for appointment. We also use the information to communicate with applicants about the appointments process.

If you refuse to provide some or all of the personal information requested, we may not be able to process your application for appointment.

If you apply

If you apply for appointment to a City board:

  • We will keep your information confidential unless you are recommended for appointment
  • We will store your personal information in a secure manner to prevent unauthorized access to it

We will limit access to your personal information to the following people:

  • City officials whose duties include processing and reviewing applications
  • Members of City Council and Council-appointed selection panels responsible for reviewing, interviewing and recommending candidates for appointments

We take applications on an on-going basis, whether there are vacancies or not, to establish pools of candidates for consideration.

We will keep you application as an active file for three years from the date you submit it. You can update the information at any time by contacting us at 416-397-0088 or appoint@toronto.ca.

If you are selected for an interview

We conduct interviews as part of committee or panel meeting. These are committee meetings for the purposes of the City of Toronto Act and must be conducted in accordance with the law.

We keep lists of people interviewed confidential. We keep minutes of these meetings, but we keep personal information confidential.

In addition to selection committee members, your interview may be attended by City officials whose duties include the public appointments process. At least one City official will be present to perform the duties of the City Clerk in recording the proceedings of the meeting.

If you are recommended for appointment

If a committee or panel recommends you for appointment to a City board, some of your personal information becomes public including your name and qualifications for appointment.

We will list your name and a summary of your qualifications on the public agenda of City Council or other appointing body. We post agendas online at www.toronto.ca/council, so your name may be indexed by search engines like Google.

City Council has the final say on appointments unless it has delegated that to another body. City Council may choose to appoint you, not appoint you or substitute another candidate.

If you are appointed

If you are appointed to a City body, we will share your personal information with authorized representatives of that body so they can register you as a member and contact you. We require City boards to have their own policies for the management of personal information.

Your name will appear in the public minutes of the meeting at which you were appointed. We post minutes online at www.toronto.ca/council.

We will post the following information on the City's website for public appointments at www.toronto.ca/ServeYourCity:

  • Your name
  • The start and end dates of your appointment
  • Any remuneration or expenses paid to you
  • A short biography stating your qualifications

Remuneration and Expenses are Public Information

Members of some bodies are entitled to remuneration or the reimbursement of approved expenses.

The City is required by law to publicly disclose on an annual basis the amounts paid to the City's appointees. You can view remuneration reports online:

The City of Toronto is committed to Protecting the Privacy of Personal information

When visiting City of Toronto web sites, part of our commitment to privacy is to explain what information may be collected and why, and how it will be used and who may have access to it. Our information processing practices have been designed to ensure compliance with the privacy provisions of the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.

When you visit City of Toronto web sites, you do so anonymously - there is no need to tell us who you are. When you do submit personal information for an application, only those who "need to know" will have access to the personal information provided.

Encryption technology protects personal information during transmission of your application. A security icon (usually a lock symbol) will also appear in your browser window. Secure pages are not saved in temporary caches on a computer. Once you exit secure screens, those screens cannot be accessed again.

Any City site where personal information is requested will contain a notice outlining our legal authority to collect it and include the following information:

  • the purpose for collecting the personal information;
  • how it will be used and who will have access to it;
  • who to contact if you have any questions about these practices

Using methods that preserve the confidentiality of personal information, records are disposed of according to a records retention schedule by-law - Toronto Municipal Code Chapter 217, Corporate Records (City).

Logging practices

The City of Toronto logs HTTP and HTTPS requests to the City's web site server. These logs record the IP address of site visitors. An IP address is the number automatically assigned to the computer or to the ISP (Internet Service Provider) requesting a URL.

Logged information, also known as clickstream data, is recorded in non-identifiable form and is used by City staff or those under contract for Web site system administration. Log files are archived and used for systems analysis, maintenance and site evaluation.

Questions

Questions about the collection of personal information for public appointments can be directed to the Manager, Public Appointments, City Clerk's Office, 12th floor, West Tower, Toronto City Hall, 100 Queen Street West, Toronto, ON M5H 2N2 or by telephone at 416-397-0088.